Study urges establishment of specialist family courts

Child protection cases in the district court often end up as a battle between the HSE and the family, according to new research.

The research was carried out by academic researchers from the School of Applied Social Studies (Dr Kenneth Burns and Caroline Shore) and the Faculty of Law (Dr Conor O’Mahony and Dr Aisling Parkes) at UCC.

It finds that the setting-up of specialist children or family courts would be the best way of improving the experiences of such cases by those involved in them.